Fi Phillips

I've been following The Prosperous Writer blog by Christina Katz this year in my drive to be a more effective writer. This week she talks about 'perseverance'. She says, "Writers who succeed in the long run do not succeed solely because they are talented. They succeed because they have cultivated the art of hanging in there". J K Rowling faced and overcame many rejection slips before her Harry Potter books found a publisher. Stephen King drove his wife to distraction (and near bankrupcy) while he beavered away at his short stories and novels before finally hitting the big time and becoming the successful, prolific published writer he is today. I have to admire these people for sticking with it and believing in themselves in the face of rejection. On bad days I beat myself up for not persevering over the distractions of the last two decades but on better days I have to admit that those years have allowed me to hone my skills and build my life experience. I can now...

I was initially going to write "I'm not talking about your general self respect, but rather your self respect as a writer" but now I think of it, the two are strongly tied together. I was brought up in a family that was loving and wanted me to write but that also felt I should have a proper job because my writing was just a hobby as far as they were concerned. I followed their lead and trained as a secretary. For years, I toiled away in office jobs and kept my writing as a safe haven to return to in my spare time. I dreamed of having my novels published but ultimately I had little respect for myself as a writer. It wasn't until I penned my first murder mystery play for the drama group I was part of that I began to think that my writing was anything more than a hobby. From then on, I began to make time for my writing, in fact guard that time ferociously. However, I still didn't call myself a writer to anyone other than my inner self. I was a secretary, a P.A., an ...